My two cents. It's basically a million horny guys looking into these girls windows and snapping photos of within the privacy of their own home. I mean, we see enough for the imagination with their short skirts and skimpy outfits on covers of GQ and Maxim, leaves just enough for the imagination but now the epitome of what man has become, we are sick world we truly live in. Delete the photos, show some dignity. You know what these girls are feeling right now? The humiliation for them and their families?

As the superstitions of various pre-technological cultures throughout history are said to have held, photography was thought of as an act of theft in which a portion of the subject's soul was removed from the body and imprisoned in another realm. We're likely to have a chuckle at the notion now, but the news from Sunday about hundreds of intimate photos from dozens of celebrities being hacked and distributed online has me rethinking whether or not there might be some truth to that way of thinking after all

As any consumer of internet pornography, myself included, can tell you – where such hacks, authentic and staged, are now commonplace – there's something different about looking at images that were not intended for our consumption that separates them from the run-of-the-mill feelings of titillation we experience when looking at professional pornography. It feels like we've stolen a piece of the woman's soul.It certainly doesn't hurt that in a case like this the photos themselves have literally been stolen. Whether through a reported iCloud security breach as seems to be the story here, hacking into someone's email, or the far more common, but no less violating, act of jilted lovers uploading photos whose safekeeping they were alone entrusted with, the end result is the same for the third party viewer: It's as if we've gotten something over on the woman. One need not furrow very deep into the comments sections under the current scandal to find evidence of this mindset. This particular cache of photos is regularly referred to as a “treasure trove,” or a “mother load,” or as a “win.” The currency in question is, of course, female sexuality, and not just the standard issue objectified variety, but rather specifically the purloined, unauthorized kind.Hunter Moore, one of the most infamous purveyors of so-called revenge porn with now-shuttered site IsAnyoneUp admitted as much to me when I spoke with him a couple of years back. (Moore has since been indicted on fifteen federal felony counts for his role in hacking into the computers of the women whose images he posted on the site).“When you're not supposed to see it, if it was given to somebody else,” he explained of the appeal of hacked photos. “...it's like you're taking away something from them. You judge them and compare yourself to them and feel better about yourself. It's all about what you're not supposed to be doing.

There's a term for seizing access to a woman's sexuality without her permission when it takes place in the physical world, and yet most of the people who consume these types of images and trade them back and forth like young men might have done with prized baseball cards in a previous generation would scoff at the suggestion that there's any analogy to be made here to rape. Much like we've seen in nearly every other realm, however, our ethics here have not caught up to the technology. Very few of us would hide in the bushes outside of a woman's home in order to catch a glimpse of her getting changed, but how is that any different from this?

When you consider this is a generation who have divorced all sense of worth from intellectual property – music, movies and so on – it's easy to see why they might think of digital dissemination of a stolen image as a victimless crime. It's on the Internet, therefore it's mine for the taking. But unlike music, for example, in which the creator wanted people to have access to it in the first place, stolen photos like these were never meant to be seen.The ways in which we talk about hacked photo scandals like this one are certainly very close to the ways we talk about rape. Consider a recent tweet from Ricky Gervais for just one example of thousands going on right now:“Celebrities, make it harder for hackers to get nude pics of you from your computer by not putting nude pics of yourself on your computer.”In other words, if you didn't want people to see you naked, you shouldn't have undressed like that.This sort of thing is a form of victim blaming that puts all of the shame on the women in question and none on those who are actually at fault. I touched on this in a piece for Esquire last year, relating the ways we talk about the concussion issue in the NFL to revenge porn.As men, we get to have it both ways: chiding our partners into sending us images, heaping praise upon the bodies of women we find attractive who have done so (and brutally mocking those we don't), then turning around and castigating them as sluts when they actually comply and it better suits our narrative. A girlfriend who sends you a naked selfie is a hero to most men, until she doesn't want to do so anymore, at which point she's a whore who sends out naked photos of herself.

It all comes back to the question of access. Men, particularly younger men raised on a steady diet of sexting and amateur porn, feel entitled to the bodies of women. This is nothing new of course. We just have so many faster and more readily available means of sating this hunger now.But in this hunt we've lost track of what the sexiest thing about a woman is in the first place: her permission, her desire, her saying, to us, “yes.”That's the exact opposite of what we're after when it comes to hacked photos. We thrill at violating her lack of permission, because the forbidden knowledge, the glimpse into her soul (through the lens of her breasts), is a rarer commodity.There's a passage in “Big Red Son”, David Foster Wallace's exceptional 1998 piece about attending the annual AVN porn awards conference that this discussion reminds me of, and I think speaks to why many of us are so thrilled by drilling down through the outward defenses of women, particularly those in the public eye. Wallace relates a story a police officer and porn fan told to a director of adult films. What he found appealing, the porn fan said, was “those rare moments in orgasm or accidental tenderness when the starlets dropped their stylized 'fuck-me-I'm-a-nasty-girl' sneer and became, suddenly, real people.”Sometimes, he says, “and you never know when, is the thing – sometimes all of a sudden they'll kind of reveal themselves...their what-do-you-call... humanness.”This is in contrast to what we see in Hollywood in the type of films that the actresses in the current photo hack appear, where the humanness is what is being faked.“In real movies, it's all on purpose. I suppose what I like in porno is the accident of it,” he concludes. Wallace concurs that this is what the best porn performers can do, which is somewhat striking in an otherwise eviscerating condemnation of the industry.To put it another way, the hottest moment of any piece of pornography is the one part that the woman didn't intend for us to see. Neither her naked body, her performative sexuality, or her lustful dialogue is enough to please the viewer. We're always seeking that which is being withheld.It's the mirror reverse of what happens when we get a glimpse at a movie star's nude photos. We're seeing the performer as human, but we're only excited because she didn't want us to. The titillation factor doesn't come in her saying yes to the actual intended recipient of the photo, but because we know she's tacitly saying no to us, and yet we've beaten her.We've beaten her.It's not just a piece of her body we're after here, it's a piece of her soul.

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

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lol

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If I can get a lot of money for it, please distribute my images as you see fit

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

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Solution: Understand they are under scrutiny, watched by the public like a hawk constantly, and that literally dozens of other celebrities have made this mistake in the past and DON'T FUCKING POSE NAKED IN FRONT OF A CAMERA.

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

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Solution: Understand they are under scrutiny, watched by the public like a hawk constantly, and that literally dozens of other celebrities have made this mistake in the past and DON'T FUCKING POSE NAKED IN FRONT OF A CAMERA.

"Why does this happen to me?"

Because they're fucking morons.

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Well for one, posting pictures on your phone is for you and only you. HOw is that being moronic? Did they upload them to Google? No they were hacked! The cloud thing is going to go crazy in the next few weeks and expect some serious money offered to the damages. They are still protected regardless of their celebrity status and it's wrong for anyone to view them.

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

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Solution: Understand they are under scrutiny, watched by the public like a hawk constantly, and that literally dozens of other celebrities have made this mistake in the past and DON'T FUCKING POSE NAKED IN FRONT OF A CAMERA.

"Why does this happen to me?"

Because they're fucking morons.

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Well for one, posting pictures on your phone is for you and only you. HOw is that being moronic? Did they upload them to Google? No they were hacked! The cloud thing is going to go crazy in the next few weeks and expect some serious money offered to the damages. They are still protected regardless of their celebrity status and it's wrong for anyone to view them.

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good thing apple's terms of agreement protect them

also who cares, stop getting butthurt over people who already sell their bodies for millions anyways

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

as a human being, I was tempted to google what all the fuss was about. but then I thought about the families, the girls who took the photos for themselves, their bf or what have you. Again, how is it different from you opening up a curtain in their bedroom and taking the picture? It's degrading and wrong. Put your child, a family member who might be attractive in their place. It's not a fun spot for these girls to be in. I hope they get a lot of money for the cloud bull shit and they find the hackers, prosecute them and pay for their actions. Severely!

Click to expand...

Solution: Understand they are under scrutiny, watched by the public like a hawk constantly, and that literally dozens of other celebrities have made this mistake in the past and DON'T FUCKING POSE NAKED IN FRONT OF A CAMERA.

"Why does this happen to me?"

Because they're fucking morons.

Click to expand...

Well for one, posting pictures on your phone is for you and only you. HOw is that being moronic? Did they upload them to Google? No they were hacked! The cloud thing is going to go crazy in the next few weeks and expect some serious money offered to the damages. They are still protected regardless of their celebrity status and it's wrong for anyone to view them.

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and you're shocked this happened? Its moronic because its happened before. A lot. Its been happening for as long as the internet has existed. Yet they keep doing it.

Half the responses from these people have been "I thought they'd been deleted". These people have no idea how the internet even works. Once something is on the internet, its there; forever.

Its like they never ask themselves "I'm about to photograph myself in the nude and put it on the internet. What could possibly go wrong?"

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

The ironic thing for me is that most IGN users lose their shit if they feel their OWN web privacy has been violated. But they're more than happy to look at stolen nudes off someone's private iCloud account.

It makes me sick. I haven't looked at a single nude picture.

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of course you do

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Am I wrong in thinking that you value your own web privacy?

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there's a difference between the united states government illegally invading privacy and some random hacker

"There's a term for seizing access to a woman's sexuality without her permission when it takes place in the physical world, and yet most of the people who consume these types of images and trade them back and forth like young men might have done with prized baseball cards in a previous generation would scoff at the suggestion that there's any analogy to be made here to rape. Much like we've seen in nearly every other realm, however, our ethics here have not caught up to the technology. Very few of us would hide in the bushes outside of a woman's home in order to catch a glimpse of her getting changed, but how is that any different from this?"

You're right, most people would scoff at the suggestion, as I do. I am not saying the hacking is right, but putting it in even in the same sentence as rape is asinine.